In an era of historic income inequality, we’ve seen an influx of films take aim at the precarious line between class, power, and the self-destructive pursuit of status. Though John Patton Ford’s How to Make a Killing isn’t one of the more provocative entries in this recent wave of class-conscious cinema—with its “Eat the Rich” commentary feeling more decorative than truly piercing—it remains one of the most pleasing and indelibly entertaining.

Plot holes, conveniences, and contrivances riddle the breezy 115-minute runtime, but feel trivial in the face of Glen Powell’s supercharged charisma, which relishes each slick, surface-level twist and turn with acerbic precision. While it lacks the measured and layered English wit of its source material—the Ealing comedy classic, Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949)—it (mostly) makes up for it with far-flung, quick-cut comedy, and a rogue’s gallery of performers chewing the scenery. While it leaves thematic meat on the bone, there’s an economy to its thrills that still taps into the moral rot of a system where meritocracy is little more than man-made myth.

Powell stars as Becket Redfellow, a young man disowned by his obscenely wealthy family because of his mother’s relationship with a lowly musician. Forced to live an “average life” while his relatives enjoy endless opulence, he takes to axing key branches of the family tree to reclaim his inheritance.

From a hack artist (Zach Woods) who fetishizes poverty, to a conning mega-church pastor (a scene-stealing Topher Grace), all the way to his foreboding, enigmatic grandfather (Ed Harris), Becket finds himself embroiled in grave familial misadventures. All the while, his unsuspecting girlfriend (Jessica Henwick) and slimy childhood rival (a delectably campy Margaret Qualley) are hot on his trail.

Though it doesn’t boast the casting conceit of the Edwardian England-set original, which featured Alec Guinness as each doomed family member, How to Make a Killing remixes its own darkly comic critique of the American Dream. Ford’s crisp, textured, warmly lit direction shapes a film that’s less interested in tearing down the elite and more vested in the hopelessness of personal advancement. A good attitude and work ethic mean little in the face of impenetrable wealth gaps. The key to the film’s titular answer lies not in pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, but in accepting that virtue is a low-value currency.

Though How to Make a Killing feels too brisk for its own good, often skipping past character details and moments that could have deepened its emotional and thematic core, its cynical, dire take on the American Dream feels refreshing and frank nonetheless.

How to Make a Killing is out now.